Recycled or Upcycled

Christmas Onesie (that even beginner sewers can make)

Danya Banya November 28, 2013 0

I was unpacking my Christmas box this week, and I pulled it this cute little Christmas onesie that I made for Bee when she was a baby, and fell in love with it all over again.

This onesie was one of my first (successful) attempts at appliqueing. It is made from scrap corduroy, various other scrap fabrics, some ribbon and a store-bought plain onesie, in size 000.

Using my very basic sewing machine, I just zigzaged all the pieces onto the onesie, starting with the tree, then adding the ribbon ‘tinsel’, and finally adding the scrap fabric circle ‘baubles’ and ‘star’.

And then, as an after thought, I flipped it over and zigzagged some holly onto the onesie’s bottom area. I’m so glad I did, because I think it turned out really cute!

I’ve since discovered that you see more of a newborn baby’s bottom than their front, especially when they are still a bit young and squidgy.

The only tricky bits are making sure that you don’t accidentally sew the two sides of the onesie together (you can unpick as long as you catch it quickly) and learning how to sew in tight circles (by lifting the foot quite a bit).

The beauty of this style of onesie is that it’s not supposed to be perfect, or neat, or anything like that. So you can oversew a few stitches here, cut a corner short there, and it will just add to the charm of the finished product. (And I’ll admit to sewing the two sides of the onesie together by a few stitches at one point, and you can’t tell at all.)

Here’s Bee modelling her onesie last Christmas, when she was almost 3 months old. Here’s the front…

And the back…

Oh how I miss those newborn snuggles!

Here’s a few more shots where Bee is showing off how much she liked tummy time. (She was such a pro, whereas poor JJ couldn’t keep her head up at all…)

Alas, it doesn’t fit her any more. But I found someone who can wear it for the next month or so – meet our ‘Little Ted’…

I’m pleased as punch that this onesie came out of the Christmas box in one piece. It’s been worn, vomited on and washed at least half a dozen times, yet has remained relatively stain-free and the stitching has held. It’s now become one of our personalised Christmas decorations to enjoy for years to come.

You can find more sewing and appliqueing ideas here.

And you can can find all our Christmas activities here, including:

Baby footprint Rudolph Christmas cards
DIY footprint “Mistletoes” – cute keepsake for babies, todders, or both!
How to make a felt garland for Christmas
DIY “Reinbeers” – great gift for beer lovers

xx Danya

Categories Babies, Christmas, For the DIY Mum Tags Recycled or Upcycled, Sewing

Quick and Easy DIY Advent Calendar (for Very Busy Parents)

Danya Banya November 26, 2013 0

Last minute advent calendar idea, to take the stress out of the Christmas countdown.

Do you ever have those “OMG it is 30th November and I haven’t gotten around to making buying an Advent Calendar this year, what the heck can I whip up at the last minute” moments?

I do. The lead up to Christmas turns me from a normal very busy parent, into a ‘Very-Busy’ parent with hyphen and capitals. (Case in point, today is 26th November, and for a blogger who wants to publish an Advent Calendar post, that’s totally the same as what mid-December is for normal people…)

But no worries, because I have the solution!

Sort through your Christmas stuff, and pull out all those old cards from last year that you were saving for some reason or other. Find a little nook, hammer in some nails, tie on some kitchen twine, and hang them up.

Then write numbers 1-24 on the outside with permanent marker.

Print out this list of activity-based advent ideas, cut them out and attach each one to the inside of the cards.

Glue would look semi-professional, but staples would be quicker. Or, if you are like me and want the flexibility to change the order around as you go (to make way for last minute Christmas party invitations and I-can’t-be-bothered days), then paper clips are a not-so-pretty, but oh-so-quick-and-effective solution.

Now, the idea of an Advent Calendar for busy parents is to add magic to the countdown to Christmas, without actually adding too much to your already burdensome To-Do list. This is why I’ve made many of the activities either things that you might be doing anyway, like sending Christmas cards or things that are super easy and fun to do, like giving out candy canes.

You can, of course, skip some and double-up on other activities. If you are going with the “paperclip method”, then to double-up just wait until the second date approaches, pinch the slip of paper from the first date and put it in the new date’s Christmas card. Too easy!

Hope this has helped to reduce some of the Christmas pressure for you. Or at least you can laugh at the lame attempts happening at our place. Luckily my three (and a half) year old will think it is magical.

You can find all our DIY Christmas crafts and activities from the past few years here, including:

our toilet paper roll Christmas Tree advent calendar that we made the following year, using the same “flexible” activities strategy.
our scratch-off advent calendar ornaments from last year, which were pretty cool! (Although it did require some planning ahead…)
Not sure what we’re going to do this year yet – maybe a book advent? Stay tuned!

We’d love you to subscribe to our newsletter, to receive all our latest activities sent straight to your inbox!

And ho ho ho, Merry Christmas to all!

xx
Danya

Categories Christmas, For the DIY Mum Tags Recycled or Upcycled

A Floral Birthday

Danya Banya September 26, 2013 0

A Floral First Birthday Party! Rose, flower & butterfly cake, cupcakes with icing flowers, a floral invitation to play, and flower wall decorations…

My little miss Bee is one!

So we thought we would have a little shindig to celebrate. As Bee’s birthday is in September (which is the start of Spring in Australia), we decided on a floral theme.

Starting with THE cake…

For the base, I used half of A Cooker and a Looker’s Butter Cake recipe (and saved the other half for another cake that I’ll post shortly). I iced it using ready-made icing (the type that is like play-doh), some of which I’d coloured using all natural food colours (so it was free of these nasty food colour additives).

I learnt how to make the roses recently on a cupcake decorating course, and I used a 3D cookie stamp for the butterflies. The other flowers, stems and leaves were improvised.

My big tip, is to use baking paper on both the table and the rolling pin when rolling out the ready-made icing. It was quite humid, and I found that otherwise the icing would stick to both. The baking paper also made it easy to flip the icing over onto the cake to make the white background.

And you can’t have a kids birthday party without cupcakes…

What’s the difference between a muffin and a cupcake? Icing on top!

Ironically I used this no-added-sugar wholemeal banana and blueberry muffin recipe, and then went and added a ton of sugar-laden icing on top. 🙂

I cookie cutter to cut out star shapes from the ready-made icing, and then stuck store-bought iced flowers on top with water. That’s cheating I know, but I had the iced flowers in my cupboard already and was looking for an excuse to use them up…

I was pleased to see that the kids were eating the whole thing (or in JJ’s case, eating the muffin and leaving the icing – bless!), so the healthy-ish cupcake / muffin base was a big hit with the toddler crowd.

And I kept one of the larger cupcakes icing-free for Bee. She hasn’t really had added sugar in her diet yet, and I’m hoping to keep it that way for a while longer.

A floral invitation to play…

As there were some older kids invited, I set up a floral “invitation to play” in a corner of our backyard.

Stems of fake flowers were displayed spilling out of watering cans and plant pots, around the log stools. I also included our dolls house and play kitchen (both council clean-up finds), our various toilet paper roll dolls, our stick family (I’ll have to blog about them another time), and a few other odds and sods that I thought would encourage some interactive play.

Flower wall decorations

On the upper level of the garden, I used these flower decorations to tie the theme together. (I love an excuse to introduce textiles).

Looking left

Looking right

These flowers were actually made a few months ago, and have up on our playroom walls over Winter. But in honour of Bee’s birthday, we brought them outside into the sunshine.

The flowers themselves were simple to make – they are just fabric glued to recycled cardboard, stuck to the fence with packing tape and/or blu-tack.

I think they added quite a bit of pop to the backyard!

We had a lovely afternoon. Bee enjoyed being the centre of attention, even if she didn’t quite understand what all the fuss was about.

What a happy and grubby birthday girl!

xx
Danya

PS: Special mention to Mrs T for the outfits and the set up, and to Megan for helping with the happy snaps. Love you both!

Categories Babies, For the DIY Mum, Outdoors Tags Birthday, Healthy, Megan Webb Photography, Recycled or Upcycled

Dot Painting

Danya Banya August 26, 2013 0

Introducing dot painting as a new (and easy) painting technique for toddlers or preschoolers.

We paint a lot at our place.

Often it’s as traditional as painting with a paintbrush on paper. Sometimes it’s finger-painting (or whole-hand painting). We’ve also painted with our feet, with cotton tips or with things we’ve found in the backyard.

But JJ’s at an age (3 years and 3 months) where she is at the end of toddlerhood, and verging on preschooler-dom. She’s at a point where I want to introduce new artistic techniques and mediums.

Originally I had a grand idea in mind: JJ would make aboriginal-inspired art using sticks from our backyard to create a traditional dot painting. And it would be awesome.

You see, this is where I went wrong – I had too much of a plan.

When JJ saw me get out the paints, she started to gather the paint brushes. “No JJ, we’re not going to use paint brushes today. We’re going to paint with sticks, like this. Can you make dots like I am?”

But she wasn’t interested. She wanted to paint with paint brushes. She wanted to paint lines and blobs. She didn’t care that Mummy has this brilliant blog post idea.

So we put the sticks away and painted an ordinary painting with paint brushes as we usually do.

I left it a few days, and then gave it another shot. This time I didn’t instruct. I didn’t even ask JJ if she wanted to paint. I just sat down and started to paint myself. And instead of introducing sticks as a new medium, I just turned the brush over and used the other end to make dots and fine lines.

Before long JJ came over to see what I was doing. She said “You’re not allowed to paint with that end of the brush Mummy”. I explained it’s OK to paint with all sorts of things. Look, I can make little lines and dots!

Then she asked if she could paint too. And she started to paint using the bristle end of the brush. And then she flipped the brush over, and started to dot…

JJ and my dot paintings on recycled cardboard

Yay, a new technique introduced!

I think we’ll try the sticks again next time.

xx
Danya

Categories Art & Crafts For Kids, Parenting, Preschoolers, Toddlers Tags Process over Product, Recycled or Upcycled

Six types of ‘Stained Glass’ Easter Eggs – that even your toddler can make!

Danya Banya March 12, 2013 0

Have you ever made faux stained glass window displays with your children? This is a nice easy craft activity that toddlers can help with.

Here are six types of Stained Glass Easter Eggs we’ve tried this week:

1. Scatters or Confetti

Scatters are shaped confetti – the sort that you scatter on top of the tablecloth at a party. The ones shown above are star shaped, but they come in all sorts of shapes and sizes, and can usually be found at your local bargain shop. The great thing about these is that they are so small and fiddly that picking them up is excellent for developing fine motor skills. Unless, *ahem*, your toddler up-ends the entire container at once.

2. Tissue Paper

Did you diligently save the lovely tissue paper from past presents? Oh good – so I’m not the only hoarder. Here’s a chance to use some of it up. It looks really good on the windows as some of the light still penetrates.

3. Cellophane

Being both shiny and transparent, this is an awesome medium for window crafts. Please ignore the dodgy pen marks.

4. Ribbons

These turned out to be really easy and effective. I just precut the ribbons to size, and showed JJ how to place them in horizontal lines, and she was able to actually do it all herself. It looks really striking on the window.

Then I let her do the squiggly one to help fend off her rebellious streak.

5. Wool

Similar to ribbons, but even squigglier. I pre-cut the wool (or yarn) and asked JJ to put the pieces on one by one. She succeeded, mostly…

6. Jewellery!

There are three types of jewellery eggs here. The first (large green) one is fake pearls and tiny clear beads. The second (bottom yellow) one is using up the pieces of a broken bracelet. (Both of these were included in a bag of crafting goodness that a friend gave to me a few weeks back. Thanks!) And the third one is using the bibs and bobs from an old and broken hanging mobile.

I can’t wear this sort of jewellery whilst my youngest baby is still pulling on and mouthing anything shiny or dangly, so this stash was at risk of sitting idle. I thought this would be a good way to bring these pieces to life in another form.

Word of warning – this sort of jewellery is a choking hazard. JJ (my eldest, at 2 years and 9 months) is no longer in the mouthing phase, so I was comfortable letting her use these for crafting under supervision. However use your discretion as to whether this would be suitable for your own child.

Would you want to make some ‘stained glass’ eggs too? It’s easy!

First off, start out with a cut-out. I used Easter Egg shaped cut-outs, partly because it it that time of year, and partly because I already had them from when we decorated paper Easter Eggs earlier this week.

Then roughly cut two pieces of pieces of self adhesive contact paper. The contact paper needs to be at least big enough to cover the hole in the cut-out entirely with about an inch spare on all sides.

Cover one side of the cut-out with a piece contact paper. (In the picture below, I put the white backing loosely back on to protect them until everything was ready.)

Then set out the cut-out, along with some items for sticking, and invite your toddler over to have a play!

This is really easy even for very young toddlers as there is no glue involved.

Once they’ve declared it’s finished, cover with the other piece of contact paper to seal, and then cut around the edges to tidy it all up a bit.

And then stick it on your window!

Have you made ‘stained glass’ at your place? Share in the comments how you do it. I’ve seen lots of variations using coffee filters and oils. We’re hoping to try them all. 😉

xx Danya

PS: If you want to see how the final window display turned out, tune in to my next post. 🙂

Categories Art & Crafts For Kids, Easter, Toddlers Tags Recycled or Upcycled

How to make a Star Headband

Danya Banya March 1, 2013 2

And the last, in my S is for Space fancy dress outfit series is…

Yes, I’m talking about that splash of stars floating somewhat precariously over my head. Now to be fair, I had to come up with a costume that I could wear whilst nursing and baby wearing. And this outfit ticked those boxes. It was super easy for me to stick to theme and care for my newborn at the same time.

(And a quick recap for those who are wondering what on earth (lol) I’m talking about – we went to an “S” fancy dress party dressed up as Space – my husband and eldest daughter wearing Sun and Saturn masks, my baby girl wearing a Satellite T-Shirt, and I wore this absolutely spectacular Star headband 🙂

My inspiration came from this Star Headband, but unfortunately there isn’t a tutorial. So I had to wing it a bit and make it up as I went along.

Here’s how I made it.

I traced a star shaped cookie cutter onto some sturdy corrugated cardboard and then used a box cutter to cut out these star shapes. About a dozen or so all up.

Cut out some stars from corrugated cardboard

Then I painted and lightly glittered one side, left to dry, then turned over and painted and lightly glittered the other side.

Paint and glitter corrugated cardboard stars

While I was waiting for the stars to dry, I grabbed a half dozen silver pipecleaners and a plain black headband. (You could also use a silver headband, but plain black was what I had on hand.)

Unfortunately I don’t have a photo of this part so you’ll have to use your imagination a little bit. With each pipecleaner, I twisted the middle around a section of the headband a few times so that the two ends were sturdily sticking up. Then I threaded the pipecleaner ends through the corrugations in the cardboard stars as far as I could without the end actually sticking out the top. I kept doing this until the headband was full of stars.

Then with the few stars that were left over, I made a star necklace by threading an old silver necklace through the cardboard corrugations in the same way.

Danya and JJ in their Star and Sun Space outfits

Photo by Megan Webb Photography

Looking back on these photos I remember how self-conscious I was as I was still carrying 15kg of baby weight. Hence why there aren’t very many photos of me and my (lovely) headband. 🙂 I’ve lost 4kg since then, so on track to hopefully lose most of it by the end of the year. Well, that’s the goal anyway…

On the way home, JJ had a lot of fun pulling the stars off this headband. She was overstimulated as kids usually are after parties, so it was a lovely quiet activity for her to focus on in the car. I didn’t bother to put it back together again when we got home, but I did keep the stars themselves for her to play with. I also have the Sun and Saturn masks hoarded away somewhere. I’m thinking of hanging them on her toy room wall for a little while.

Actually, these Space theme party outfits sparked her interest in all things space for several weeks afterwards. Here are some photos of us playing with chalk outside our place one afternoon – does the satellite look familiar?

Space chalk drawings of a satellite, the moon and some stars

Anyway that’s enough space talk for this little blog for now.

Hope you have a lovely weekend. Chat soon.

Danya

Categories Art & Crafts For Kids, For the DIY Mum Tags Recycled or Upcycled

S is for Satellite

Danya Banya February 28, 2013 0

How to make a baby satellite appliqué T-shirt

What do you wear to an “S” themed party?

Why Space Outfits of course!

S is for Space, Sun, Stars, Saturn, Satellite, Solar System

Original image by Megan Webb Photography

Earlier this week I showed you how to make the Sun and Saturn facemasks, and here is how to make my Stars headband. And now I’ll show you how I made little Baby Bee’s Satellite T-Shirt.

But first up. Awwww. Isn’t she the cutest little Satellite you ever did see? She’s was only 2.5 months old at this party, and despite my headband, she was definitely the star of the show. Cluck cluck cluck.

I chose a T-Shirt appliqué for her outfit, because at that tender young age, I needed something comfortable. Something soft. Something she could nurse in and sleep in.

Here’s how.

First I bought a cheap little plain black T-Shirt and shorts (to represent the black space) in the smallest size I could find, and then took them here, there and everywhere to convert them into a newborn size.

Then I googled satellites, and discovered there are some really tricky images of satellites that I would have no hope of replicating in fabric. I chose this one, which seemed remotely do-able, and copied the design onto the back of some iron-on sewable adhesive.

Drawing of a satellite on iron-on sewable adhesive

I chose some four shades of grey fabric from my mammoth fabric stash (I keep getting donations of old clothes that are no-longer wearable but the fabric is still salvageable – it’s awesome!) and ironed on the adhesive, cut out the shapes, and then ironed them onto the T-Shirt. The design becomes reversed, but that doesn’t matter for a design like this where there is no right or wrong way round.

By now we were running behind schedule, and I had Mr Banya breathing down my neck to finish the damn outfits. So I wizzed this around the sewing machine at lightning speed. Luckily I like little flaws.

And here’s how it turned out.

Baby satellite T-Shirt fancy dress outfit

BUT, once we got to the party, Bee decided to do what newborns do best, and that was nurse, cry and sleep, and repeat. So the family shot above is the only one of her actually awake and happy. For the rest of the night, all you could see of her outfit was this.

Image by Megan Webb Photography

Oh well, at least I knew that she was in theme. 🙂

xxx

Danya

PS: Just in case you are interested, Bee’s satellite also makes a star appearance (lol, space humour) when JJ and I were playing outside with chalk one afternoon.

Categories Babies, For the DIY Mum Tags Megan Webb Photography, Recycled or Upcycled, Sewing

How to make Sun and Saturn Face Masks

Danya Banya February 27, 2013 0

Original photo by Megan Webb Photography

What do you wear to an “S” themed fancy dress party? Space outfits of course!

Today, I’m sharing with you how to make a Saturn and a Sun face mask.

First up, the sun, for my gorgeous little girl JJ.

Luckily I keep a stash of I’m-sure-it-will-be-useful-one-day recycling in our hoarding room study. So I found a piece of sturdy corrugated cardboard (that had once been an infant car-seat box in a previous life) that would be perfect to upcycle.

I drew the inner circle by tracing around a saucer, then I free drew the sun’s rays and cut it all out with a Stanley knife (or utility knife or box cutter – whatever those knife-thingies are called). Then I raided JJ’s paint supplies and painted on yellows and oranges, and glued on some yellow glitter. Cos, you know, everything needs a bit of sparkle.

Next I glued on some strips of yellow felt around the inner ring, pegging until it was dry, as I didn’t want the mask to chaff my daughters chin.

Lastly, I stapled on some elastic to the back with my staple gun (which, by the way, was the best birthday present ever – thanks bro!)

Ta da! Doesn’t she just shine!

Photo by Megan Webb Photography

Technically she is supposed to be wearing all black, as her clothes should have been the “space”, but it was an unseasonably cold afternoon and we ended up raiding the emergency jumper stash in the back of the car and found this pink and grey number which she wouldn’t take off for the photos. Kids don’t understand the need for blog-pretty photos sometimes! Anyway, I digress…

Next up, was Saturn.

I used this Martha Stewart costume as my inspiration. Then I elicited the help of my Dad to draw on the design and cut it out. The cricket was on the tele at the time, so he didn’t mind…

Thanks Dad!

Then I painted the planet yellow and orange, and the rings silver with a touch of blue, and glued on some yellow and silver glitter. Given that it was for my husband to wear, I probably should have skipped on the glitter, but you know, sometimes I get a bit carried away. 🙂

I decided to roughly blacken out the areas in between the rings and the planet using black packing tape. I decided against cutting holes instead, as I wanted the mask to retain it’s sturdiness. I feared if I had cut the sections around the rings, the whole thing would be weak enough that my toddler would destroy it in seconds.

And there you have it. A Sun and a Saturn, two parts of our little Space Family.

Photo by Megan Webb Photography

Saturn kissing the sun - father daughter love

Photo by Megan Webb Photography

And here we are all together, one big happy Solar System.

Outer Space family! Sun, Saturn, Stars, Satellite - the whole solar system

Photo by Megan Webb Photography

Click here to see more photos. And I’ll fill you in on how I made the Stars and the Satellite tomorrow.

xxx
Danya

PS: If you’re super keen and into masks and things like that, you might like to have a yander over to this old post to see some zoo animal face masks I made last year…

Categories Art & Crafts For Kids, For the DIY Mum, Imaginative Play Tags Megan Webb Photography, Recycled or Upcycled